Tuesday, 11 June 2013

Baked Porridge for Breakfast

It has taken me a long time to come around to enjoying porridge. I remember being a child and my older sister and my dad eating porridge. It was so gluggy and gloopy that it was a mystery as to why they loved it. Finally this autumn I started eating it each morning. And loving it. So much so that I decided to try a baked version this weekend.

I usually eat my microwaved porridge with raspberries and apple.

Firstly let me tell you how I learned to love the glug. We go through breakfast fads in our house. When E and Sylvia were eating a boiled egg every morning, I shuddered at the idea of eating them, despite wanting to eat out of those cute egg cups. It was a different matter when they started each day with a bowl of porridge. I love so much food with oats that it seemed odd to not eat porridge.

I started to eat a spoonful of Sylvia's leftovers occasionally. Then I started to try a little porridge with a lot of fruit (see above) and now I really love it. We usually make porridge in the microwave.

This baked porridge has raspberries and grated apple in it.

I was intrigued with how porridge would taste if baked in the oven instead of microwaving it. I was initially interested in Heidi Swanson's baked oatneal. Then I saw Jo at Including Cake had a simpler version without egg and baking powder. Her baked oatmeal was more like our porridge but baked rather than microwaved. I finally had time over the long weekend to try it.

This is the oat mixture before being baked.

I normally load my usual porridge with fruit after it is cooked. I loved how the fruit was cooked in the baked version. It was plenty sweet enough but it was quite soft and even a little milky. I am not into creamy milky breakfasts. I had hoped it would be more crunchy around the edges. For now I think it is simpler to stick to the microwave version.

In the future I see more experiments with baked porridge. I may even experiment with pinhead oats or stovetop porridge (as recommended in The Guardian.) Below are some ideas to guide me. I am sending this baked porridge to Elizabeth's Kitchen for this month's Breakfast Club. The theme is high fibre.

20 comments:

One of the things I love about ordinary porridge is the smoothness - is the baked crustiness quite pronounced? Or does it all just meld together when you mix it up? Oats are the best though. I'm glad you've found your porridge mojo. ;-D

I like my oats soaked overnight in the fridge (Bircher style) then heated up delicious. But you could use the soak method and then bake it in the oven. Hmmmm might give that a try on the weekend.

Oats are my favourite food too....yesterday I had oats for breakfast..I had fruitbread that had oat bran and oat milk in it for morning tea...then leftover crustless fish pie which had oat bran and oat milk in it for lunch..then for dessert berry crumble with you guessed it oats as the crumble.

Thanks Helen - I've always avoided bircher style oats as I am not keen on cold soaked oats but warming them up sounds really good or even baking them (might make them crunchier if soaked first) - oats are very versatile - I love them in lots of recipes too

Thanks Hannah - funny you should say this - Sylvia fortunately is only allergic to peanuts (though I would love to share peanut butter with her) - I haven't been able to get her to eat other nut butters but today I needed a pick me up so I melted some chocolate and mixed it and cashew butter through some leftover porridge and it was amazing! (oh I know you probably don't do the chocolate thing but I needed chocolate)

I have never had baked porridge but do go through stages with porridge more generally. Sometimes I love it, othertimes it does seem like unappealing 'glug'! I did enjoy it as a child though because we got to choose whether to add sultanas or golden syrup and the freedom of that choice, and the delicious sweetness from either option, were quite wonderful.

Thanks Kari - I still occasionally see the porridge that I disliked in my childhood but the fruit helps me overcome that - golden syrup sounds good on porridge - we have tried our hazelnut agave and that is lovely (as is chocolate or fruit mince)

I'm a big fan of porridge, myself. Even as a child, but then my mother used to buy microwaveable instant sachets and my brother and I would fight over the different flavours! Nothing beats a good hearty bowl of porridge in the morning and this baked version sounds intriguing! Thanks for sharing with the Breakfast Club! (Apologies for taking so long to comment!)

Thanks elizabeth - E loves the sachets of porridge but it just seems as easy to make our own - and I think I like the texture of the rolled oats - we do experiment with making our own flavours occasionally - I tried doing a gingerbread one on the weekend so now Sylvia is really into treacle in hers

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Recipes and reflections in which our vegetarian heroine dreams of being tall and graceful as a giraffe; being a goddess in the kitchen; and being gladdened by green gadgets, green food and green politics because green is the colour of hope. See About Me for more info.